The ALDH2*2 allele is thought to occur exclusively in Asians; however, its prevalence varies across Asian ethnicities (see Table 1). Five studies determined the ALDH2 genotype in Han Chinese and Taiwanese people.5 In these studies, 20 to 47 percent of the participants were heterozygous and 1 to 8 percent were homozygous for ALDH2*2 (Goedde et al. 1992; Luo et al. 2001, 2005; Novoradovsky et al. 1995; Shen et al. 1997). Overall, approximately one-third of the Han Chinese possessed at least one ALDH2*2 allele. The prevalence of the ALDH2*2 allele was particularly high in one study of Han Taiwanese and two studies of Chinese Americans, with about half of these samples possessing at least one ALDH2*2 allele, including 7 to 8 percent who were homozygous for ALDH2*2 (Hendershot et al. 2005; Luczak et al. 2004; Novoradovsky et al. 1995). The large variation in prevalence rates found among Han Chinese and Taiwanese samples might be explained by the different geographic locations from which the samples were obtained. The sample with the highest prevalence was from Taiwan, where 55 percent of participants possessed
